Review
'Charles Elton's humour is as pitch-black and merciless as Darkwood itself... This is an extraordinary debut, not only for its confident storytelling but for its nerdish familiarity with such an eclectic range of subjects: the costume melodramas of Gainsborough film studios in the early 1950s, contemporary Los Angeles, publishing contracts and even Mexican cuisine. The author details on the book jacket don't reveal whether he's working on his second novel; I hope that he is' --The Sunday Times
Product Description
And out of the Darkwood Mr Toppit comes, and he comes not for you, or for me, but for all of us. When The Hayseed Chronicles, an obscure series of children's books, become world-famous millions of readers debate the significance of that enigmatic last line and the shadowy figure of Mr Toppit who dominates the books. The author, Arthur Hayman, an unsuccessful screenwriter mown down by a concrete truck in Soho, never reaps the benefits of the books' success. The legacy passes to his widow, Martha, and her children - the fragile Rachel, and Luke, reluctantly immortalised as Luke Hayseed, the central character of his father's books. But others want their share, particularly Laurie, the overweight stranger from California, who comforts Arthur as he lies dying, and has a mysterious aganda of her own that changes all their lives. For buried deep in the books lie secrets which threaten to be revealed as the family begins to crumble under the heavy burden of their inheritance. Spanning several decades, from the heyday of the British film industry after the war to the cut-throat world of show business in Los Angeles, Mr Toppit is a riveting tale of the unexpected effects of sudden fame and fortune. Not since Jonathan Coe's What a Carve Up! has a novel managed to capture a family and a society to such wonderfully funny and painful effect.
Penguin
Q & A with Charles Elton, Author of Mr Toppit
Where did the idea for Mr Toppit first come from?
When I was a literary agent, I worked with the Estate of A.A.Milne and had always been struck by the level of unwanted fame that was foisted on his son Christopher Robin Milne by being a character in Winnie The Pooh. He - and the books - were a global phenomenon in the 1920's and I wondered what would happen today when the outlets of fame - movies, TV, merchandising, the internet - are so much more numerous than they were. That was the only idea I started with. Everything else came as I wrote.
It took you a long time to write – why was this?
The book took an embarrassingly long time to write - 15 years. You can put that down to laziness, or - if you're generous - the fact that I was a TV producer with a very busy life. I didn't have a deadline and in a strange way I wasn't writing it to be published - I just wanted to see if I could do it. It was my hobby, like a train set in the attic that I could retreat to when I had time.
Did it change a lot during that time?
I wrote so slowly that I didn't need to do a lot of rewriting. I never planned anything or made notes. Most of the best things in the book came as I went along. I cut about 25000 words from the first half, not plot - just things I had overwritten. The second half is more or less unchanged from when I first wrote it.
The Hayseed Chronicles feel very real; could you see a day when these might actually be written and published?
Some people have thought that the 'Hayseed' excerpts in the book are like the tip of the iceberg and that I wrote much more. In fact, the bits in my book are all there ever were. I thought that the less I put in, the more enigmatic it would be. I suppose it's in my head somewhere - as an exercise I wrote jacket copy for the five Hayseed books, and found that there was more of a plot than I thought. Luke Hayseed's mother turns out to be in league with Mr Toppit.
What are you working on now?
I'm writing another book about a dysfunctional family - this time a strange dynasty of folk singers and political activists. I've written about 20000 words and have no idea what happens next.
About the Author
Charles Elton worked as a designer and editor in publishing before becoming a director of the literary agency, Curtis Brown. Since 1991 he has worked in television and has been Executive Producer in drama at ITV since 2000. Among his productions are the Oscar-nominated short Syrup, The Railway Children, Andrew Davies' adaptation of Northanger Abbey and the recent series Time Of Your Life.
